Now Where Was I...?

Hello All,

Today marks many things in the world. First and foremost Barack Obama will be sworn in as the 44th US President 45 minutes from now (it is 7:15 pm here in Nizhny Novgorod). Also, and possibly just as important: I will be boarding a train in a few hours and heading on my way to Eketarinbourg, which lies on the other side of the Ural Mountains, meaning I will be officially in Siberia. I think. Or Asia. One of the two. Or both. I'll check on that and get back to you.

At any rate not much has happened since I last wrote. We finished our day of touring, came back and completely crashed as we were so tired. Then we woke up, got ready, and headed out to see what Russia's "Third Capitol" had to offer. There is this very cool pedestrian street which runs from the old city kremlin to a park dedicated to Maxim Gorky (just like everything else in this city) and it is apparently 3 kilometers long...though I've walked it a half dozen times at least and I'm beginning to doubt that. Still, it's a good distance and is home to nothing but shops, cafes, restaurants and theaters, so it has a lot to offer.

Ed and I found a restaurant there which was a nice place and did a very good do of rabbit over whipped potatoes. (Fyi: EVERYTHING in this country includes meat and potatoes, even dessert it seems like). After that we headed off in search of a true Russian night club. Two things were working against us in this endeavour; first it was a Monday night, second it was a Russian Orthodox holiday. Basically we were shit out of luck. BUT, on the bright side we did get to walk all over the city and it was very beautiful because it was snowing so damned much, but not so aggressively as to make being outside unpleasant.

The night ended in failure and after reading about four sentences of Tolstoy I passed out. We finally managed to wake up at about 11:30 (the first time we've slept past 9 am). We had a luxuriously paced day which included a 2 hour lunch at this fun place near where we had had dinner. I must report that both restaurants have very interesting and dressing-heavy versions of a Ceasar salad. After this we walked around and took some pictures of several of the many dilapidated buildings which make up the back streets of Nizhny.

By the way, I'm almost positive that simply referring to this city as "Nizhny" would be like calling LA "Los". But whatever...

So we walked around a bunch, took some pictures, found a coffee shop and spent over an hour there. Really nice day. Culturally speaking we weren't missing a lot because after seeing one Gorky Museum, you've seen them all; and after walking about their kremlin, there isn't a whole lot of historic importance to see in this city. This brings us to the rest of the night, which is going to include watching Obama become president, eating dinner (I hope) and going to bed early enough that waking up at 4 am won't COMPLETELY suck.

The next time I write I will be in Siberia. Or Asia. Or one of the two. Or both.

Cheers,

Armen